Buried Glory

Portraits of Soviet Scientists

Istvan Hargittai

Concise biographies of twelve significant Soviet scientists, placed in the historical context of the Cold War USSR.

Engagingly written by an established author and scientist with firsthand knowledge of the world of Soviet science.

Buried Glory

Portraits of Soviet Scientists

Istvan Hargittai

Description

The apex of Soviet science as seen through the lives of twelve of the USSR's most eminent researchers

Moscow's Novodevichy Cemetery is the final resting place of some of Russia's most celebrated figures, from Khrushchev and Yeltsin to Anton Chekhov, Sergei Eisenstein, Nikolai Gogol, and Mikhail Bulgakov. Using this famed cemetery as symbolic starting point, Buried Glory profiles a dozen eminent Soviet scientists-nine of whom are buried at Novodevichy-men who illustrate both the glorious heights of Soviet research as well as the eclipse of science since the collapse of the USSR.

Drawing on extensive archival research and his own personal memories, renowned chemist Istvan Hargittai bring these figures back to life, placing their remarkable scientific achievements against the tense political backdrop of the Cold War. Among the eminent scientists profiled here are Petr L. Kapitza, one of the most brilliant representatives of the great generation of Soviet physicists, a Nobel-Prize winner who risked his career-and his life-standing up for fellow scientists against Stalin. Yulii B. Khariton, who ran the highly secretive Soviet nuclear weapons laboratory, Arzamas-16, despite being Jewish and despite the fact that his father Boris had been sent to the labor camps. And Andrei D. Sakharov, the "father of the Soviet hydrogen bomb " and a brilliant fighter for human rights, for which he won the Nobel Peace Prize. Along the way, Hargittai shines a light on the harrowing conditions under which these brilliant researchers excelled. Indeed, in the post-war period, Stalin's anti-Semitism and ongoing anti-science measures devastated biology, damaged chemistry, and nearly destroyed physics. The latter was saved only because Stalin realized that without physics and physicists there could be no nuclear weapons.

The extraordinary scientific talent nurtured by the Soviet regime belongs almost entirely to the past. Buried Glory is both a fitting tribute to these great scientists and a fascinating account of scientific work behind the Iron Curtain.

Buried Glory

Portraits of Soviet Scientists

Istvan Hargittai

Author Information

Istvan Hargittai, University Professor, Institute of General and Analytical Chemistry, Budapest Technical University

Istvan Hargittai is a University Professor at the Institute of General and Analytical Chemistry, Budapest Technical University. He is also a Research Professor and Head of Department at the Structural Chemistry Research Group of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences at Eötvös University, and is a member of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences and the Academia Europaea (London).

Buried Glory

Portraits of Soviet Scientists

Istvan Hargittai

Reviews and Awards

"a significant contribution to the study of Soviet science; a wide audience of readers will benefit from this book ... Highly recommended." - N.M. Brooks, CHOICE

Buried Glory

Portraits of Soviet Scientists

Istvan Hargittai

From Our Blog

By Istvan Hargittai The Los Alamos National Laboratory came to life in 1943 as the concluding segment of the Manhattan Project to produce the atomic bombs for the US Army. In August 1945, these bombs were dropped over Hiroshima and Nagasaki.